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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27792409">until it burns my bones</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/weareinnoir/pseuds/takunism'>takunism (weareinnoir)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>one thousand lonely stars [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>JO1 (Japan Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Cyberpunk, M/M, Pre-slash? maybe, android!shion, basically: shion has an existential crisis for 2k words straight, no beta november</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 08:15:25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,501</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27792409</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/weareinnoir/pseuds/takunism</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He's never felt <i>incomplete</i>, just... <i>curious</i> as to what he was meant for. Not even Ruki knows. It's a feeling that's only grown, in the brief time he's known Syoya.</p><p>It's that unsureness, and something else, that Shion feels in all of his circuitry, from his fingertips to the wiring in his brain, during these quiet moments with his closest friend.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kimata Syoya/Tsurubo Shion, side!rukisei, side!ynrk</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>one thousand lonely stars [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2033332</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>until it burns my bones</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>This part of the city — a rooftop in the advertising district, right under a new designer drug advertisement hologram — is the closest thing there is to quiet in New Tokyo; there's still the buzz of the city below, and it's not like someone with hearing as pinpoint accurate as Shion ever gets to experience <em>silence</em>, but it's close enough. Syoya parks his bike and sits down on the edge, knees drawn to his chest, and Shion joins him, legs dangling from the side. (It isn't that Shion isn't afraid of falling; it's that he trusts Syoya to catch him.) The hologram passes through the tap of them, every now and again, bathing him in a purple light that makes him look inhuman. Shion doesn't say a word — he doesn't dare disturb Syoya while he gazes at that smog-covered night sky squeezes into himself — he looks so <em>small</em> like this that Shion figures that the sensation of a chest squeezing <em>must</em> be this.</p><p>Shion doesn't know what he was built for, not really; the fact that he's a prototype, only the fourth droid Whiterock Industries made before being swallowed with the rest of Tokyo by Mercury Industries, is something he's reminded of every time he looks at the serial number faintly engraved on to his wrist. He's never felt <em>incomplete</em>, just... <em>curious</em> as to what he was meant for. Not even Ruki knows. It's a feeling that's only grown, in the brief time he's known Syoya.</p><p>It's that unsureness, and something else, that Shion feels in all of his circuitry, from his fingertips to the wiring in his brain, during these quiet moments with his closest friend.</p><p>They stay like that for a while, before Syoya stands up. "We should probably go home before Sho gets worried," he says. "Right?"</p><p><em>Let's stay out for longer</em> is what Shion wants to say; instead, he nods, brushing himself off. "Homewards," he replies, voice soft, a perfect facsimile of friendly casualness. Syoya gets on his bike and Shion walks to sit behind him, arms around his waist, like they've done a million times.</p><p>Sometimes, Shion wonders if this distance is the closest he can get.</p><hr/><p>The safehouse — it was a textiles factory, once, before Tokyo was New, or any corporation's plaything — is on the outskirts of the city; it's a long ride back, and it's always interesting, watching the blazing neon fade into darkness and hearing the blasting noise from every direction turn into cicadas crying out just to prove they're alive. Syoya pulls his bike around the back, like usual, and walks inside.</p><p>And it's a makeshift kind of family, living in the safehouse, but Shion's looked in every dictionary loaded into his knowledge cortex — it <em>is</em> a family. His family.</p><p>Sho's the one that took Shion and Ruki in, on the day they'd escaped from the Whiterock building together; his heart's too big for his body, taking care of the rest of them like he does, and shouldering the responsibility of their meager Mithril operation by himself. (It <em>was</em> by himself, anyways; Shion sees Ruki helping him now and then, the two of them huddled close, sitting next to each other at the kitchen table, whispering in numbers that Shion doesn't quite understand.) He greets Syoya and Shion as soon as they step into the house: "How's the rest of the world doing?"</p><p>"It's still there," Syoya says; the half-joke has been a part of their routine for longer than Shion has stayed at the safehouse. "Is dinner ready?"</p><p>"It's about to be!" yells a voice from the kitchen — there's Junki, like usual, somehow creating magic out of the scraps and cast-off ingredients that Shosei finds during... whatever he does during the day. (Syoya does deliveries, and Shion frequently joins him; Shosei's <em>quiet</em>, clearly still a little shaken up by whatever it was that brought him to the safehouse in the first place, but he goes towards Ruki like a ship on stormy seas goes towards a lighthouse. When he's not around Ruki, experimenting with formulas for the four drugs that rule trade all across New Tokyo, Shion isn't quite sure what he gets up to, only that he always comes home with real, proper ingredients.) "I'm making carbonara!"</p><p>"What's carbonara?" Syoya asks.</p><p>Shion doesn't have to search his cortex to find it for very long. "A pasta sauce made with cured pork, egg, and grated cheese," he spouts, automatically. "Shosei, where'd you find <em>cured pork</em>?"</p><p>Shosei's spread out on the couch, Ruki sitting down next to him. "The market," he replies, dryly.</p><p>"The market," Sho repeats. "There are about a million markets in the advertising district <em>alone</em> —"</p><p>"Everything was safe, don't worry," Shosei mumbles, half into the pillow he's lying against. "Can I skip dinner? I'm tired."</p><p>"Shosei —"</p><p>"Let him rest," Ruki says, in that firm tone that always seems to make Sho concede. There's a look in his eyes that Shion can't read — there are a lot of human emotions like that that, frustratingly, Shion isn't quite sure of.</p><p>But, sure enough, Sho bites his lip and nods. "I'll make sure you get some leftovers when you're awake," he says, tone resigned. "Syoya, Shion, you're eating, right?"</p><p>It's not really <em>eating</em>, in Shion's case — he has taste receptors and can recharge using carbon and water based substances, which is a lot like eating — but he nods. "Yeah, serve me some noodles."</p><p>"Me too," Syoya says, stepping just a little closer to Shion, and making the droid's machinery whirr.</p><p>"I'm glad at least some of you kids are eating..." Sho says, worry lacing his voice. He shakes it off an instant later, like it was never there at all. "Junki, you need any help?"</p><p>"Just with cutting stuff!" Junki replies, as Sho makes his way towards the kitchen. There's the faint sound of Shosei's breath slowing as he sleeps, and Syoya's fingers drumming against his arms, and the pans in the kitchen sizzling, and Shion takes it all in, more grateful for this place that he's found for himself than he has words for.</p><hr/><p>"Hey, Shion... can you tell me a story?"</p><p>That's the other regular thing, with Shion and Syoya, when they get moments to themselves; they sleep (though, again, in Shion's case, it isn't really <em>sleep</em>; he has a recharge period of about eight hours where he's not conscious, but he doesn't get to dream, not like Syoya does) in the same room, on beds less than a foot apart, and more often than not, Syoya ends up asking Shion for a story. He's got all this stuff in his knowledge cortex, things that he has no need for, and stories that send Syoya right to sleep are one of them. "Any specific one?" he asks; Syoya does have his favorites, as Shion now knows.</p><p>Tonight, though, Syoya shakes his head. His black hair is messy from rolling around in an attempt to sleep, his long bangs covering his eyes, and while Shion looks over at him, there's that sensation again — that <em>chest squeezing</em> that he isn't used to. "Whichever one you think is going to help me sleep," Syoya replies, words half-swallowed by a yawn.</p><p>"Okay," Shion says. He searches for just a moment before settling on one that's new to him, too; it's almost like another voice is coming out of him as he tells it, eyes closing.</p><p>"Orihime," he begins, "was the daughter of Tentei, the king of the sky. She wove beautiful clothes on the banks of the Milky Way. Her father loved her cloth, but she was sad, because she worked so hard at her craft that she'd never get to fall in love with anyone."</p><p>Syoya makes a noise that Shion's familiar with — one that means he's going to be peacefully sleeping soon — so Shion continues. "Tentei was concerned about his daughter, so he arranged her to meet with Hikoboshi, a cowherd who lived on the opposite side of the Milky Way. They fell in love at first sight, and were married shortly after..."</p><p>Shion trails off as Syoya's breathing slows; he doesn't have to look to his side to know that Syoya's eyes are fluttering shut, sleep taking him over. Shion wonders about dreams, sometimes; though he objectively knows that they're little more than a human brain spitting out memories and miscellany during rest, he finds himself thinking about what he'd see.</p><p>It hasn't been long since his activation; his first memory is still from just a little over half a year ago, of the <em>fear</em> on Ruki's face as the two of them escaped from Mercury's... <em>invasion</em> of the last Whiterock building. A life that started with that wouldn't have happy dreams, Shion thinks.</p><p>He doubts a life like Syoya's would, either.</p><p>But he banishes those thoughts, before lifting up his shirt just enough to reveal the socket in his side, plugging himself in for the night. It's a harsh reminder that he's not human — that he's not like Syoya, that there's this impenetrable barrier separating the two of them. It's something Shion tries not to dwell on; the thought makes him want to lash out, or push Syoya away, for some reason.</p><p>Tonight, though, as he lets himself slip away, it sticks in his mind, for some reason.</p><hr/><p>Maybe that thought, that harsh reminder, is why Shion decides not to go with Syoya on their usual delivery the next day. (He ignores the way Syoya looks unmistakably disappointed at those words.) It ends up being a rather quiet day, because of that — Shosei's off doing whatever it is he does, joined by Ruki, and Junki's working some business deal that Shion doesn't have it in him to understand. Sho's the only one left; he sits at the kitchen table, a mug of coffee in his hands.</p><p>For some reason that Shion can't quite articulate, he really, <em>really</em> doesn't want to be alone; without a word, he sits across from Sho, head bowed down. (It's like his thoughts are too heavy to be carried by his head, even though that's not remotely how his "thoughts" work.)</p><p>"You didn't go with Syoya today," Sho says, after a few moments of silence. "Is everything okay with you two?"</p><p>Shion nods. "It is," he replies, though he can't bring himself to meet Sho's gaze. Why did they program this... this insecurity, in him, he wonders. It feels like he's short-circuiting. "...It is," he repeats, more for his sake than Sho's.</p><p>He then leans forward, petulantly stretching his arms across the table, like a little kid. "Do you ever feel like... there's too much inside you for the rest of your body to keep up with?" he asks, carefully. "Or like you're... overloading?"</p><p>Sho nods immediately, and relief washes over Shion. "I think we all get that way, sometimes," Sho says, voice steady. "There's a lot we do here — there's a lot to be overwhelmed <em>by.</em>"</p><p>"That's... good to hear," Shion says. "I've been... feeling... that, a lot, lately."</p><p>"Is that why you're not out with Syoya right now?" Sho's tone is so warm that it almost hurts; Shion can't cry, but god, does he ever feel like he's about to. "Like, Syoya is the cause of your... overwhelmedness?"</p><p>Shion nods, gaze fluttering down. "I want him to be happy. And safe," he explains carefully, tracing a pattern on the old wooden table with his finger. "I want to give him... everything that it's possible for me to give him. But I know I can't, because I'm not..."</p><p>Shion trails off, clenching his fist. "Because I'm not like anyone else here," he decides. <em>Because I can't be.</em></p><p>Sho hums softly. He takes another long, long sip of coffee, before he speaks again. "I don't think that should stop you."</p><p>"Huh?"</p><p>"I think what you feel towards Syoya," Sho says, carefully, putting his mug of coffee down, "is very human."</p><p>Leave it to Sho to read between Shion's lines — a choked noise, one Shion didn't know he could make, leaves his throat. "What?"</p><p>"It's human," Sho repeats. "Feeling overwhelmed because you like somebody so much — wanting to be around them, but not wanting that either, because it's painful... it's something all of us go through." There's something in his voice that makes Shion sure of what he's saying, but then it hits him — <em>all of us.</em></p><p><em>All of us.</em> "But I'm —"</p><p>"Shion," Sho says, voice firm and steady, "you're just as human as the rest of us. I could've told you that when you and Ruki came here. But if you ever need something to assure you of that, just remember the way you feel right now, okay?"</p><p>"O...okay," Shion manages, after a moment. He wishes he <em>could</em> cry, suddenly — it'd make it a lot easier to <em>feel this much</em> if he had an outlet for it. "Thank you," he adds.</p><p>Sho reaches across the table and ruffles Shion's hair affectionately. "You wanna help me out with sorting some of the Mith that Ruki and Shosei made yesterday?" he asks. Shion nods, happy for the distraction, and stands up quickly to do so.</p><hr/><p>"Hey, Shion."</p><p>"Mm?"</p><p>"How's that story end? The one you told me last night," Syoya asks. His voice is so low and sleepy that it makes a jolt go through Shion's spine.</p><p>"The weaver and the cowherd? Um, hold on. Let me see," he replies, checking. The information is at the forefront of his cortex; he brings it up with ease. "Orihime and Hikoboshi fell in love and were married, but neglected their duties, and so, Tentei ordered them to separate. They meet once a year, on July 7th."</p><p>"Once a year. That would hurt," Syoya says, rolling over in his bed to face Shion. "If you love somebody so much that you... stopped weaving cloth on the Milky Way for them, only to be separated like that..."</p><p>"It would," Shion agrees, quietly. "But at the same time, that one day must feel like... like it's worth the other 364 being apart." He imagines that it's him and Syoya, and nods, just to himself; he's sure, more sure than he's ever been of anything, that it'd be worth it to have just one day with Syoya, as long as they were together. "I mean, it's not like I'd know, or anything..."</p><p>"...No, that... I get that too," Syoya says, words slurring together as tiredness takes him over. "Maybe if it was you and me."</p><p>"What?"</p><p>But Syoya's silent — he's fallen asleep already. Shion ignores the way it feels like his chest is fried as he plugs himself in, shutting himself off. (It's <em>not</em> running away from how it makes him feel; he's sure that come tomorrow, he'll be able to face up to whatever this is.)</p><p>(And even if he's not... well, it's like the story, almost; just one day more like this, as the safe thing, as the droid best friend, before tumbling into something far deeper, might just be worth it.)</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>happy burfday joha i hope u like this and also hello welcome to my new series!! updates will be sporadic (i mean the one writing it is me, ya girl) but not only will everyone else show up eventually, there will be intrigue and fun. i'm excited. yee. title from highway of endless dreams by m83; series name from instant crush by daft punk ft. julian casablancas!</p><p>cyberpunk jo1! let's go!</p><p>come yell at me for being bad at writing in the comments or at @jo1taku on twitter &lt;3</p></blockquote></div></div>
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